November 24, 2004 | ae ls There A Garbage Crisis at UNBC? A campus full of wasteful sinners - and some redemption as well Every week, students at residence are throwing out more than 1,630,728 square inches of garbage. In other terms, that's approximately 943 cubic feet, or just over 26 cubic meters of garbage going to:the landfill in single week: A SPECIAL REPORT BY BRYNA CASEY STAFF WRITER If you have an urge to lose faith in humanity, specifically in students, I rec- ommend that you walk between the resi- dences and check out the garbage bins in Residence Court on Monday mornings. In one weekend (the bins are not emp- tied during the weekend) the massive bins are full of all sorts of things, and not just full of garbage. In my. first weeks of observing the garbage process in residence, I saw at the top of the dumpster a Barbie, two back- packs, a couple shirts and a few unmatched socks. The second week I located a camera, book bag, textbook and two pairs of name brand jeans. During both of these weeks I also was surprised to see numerous recy- clable items such as tin cans, milk jugs, water bottles, tetra packs, and aluminum cans. At the beginning of the term when stu- dents were moving into the residences Prince George Sanitation set up two gatbage bins, both of which have a hold- ing a capacity of 3.83 tones. These bins were emptied 7 times in the first weeks of terms. During regular term time however, the 2 garbage bins between Neyoh and Keyoh, both measuring 66 inches deep, 71 inches wide, and 58 inches tall, have to be emptied three times a week. What does that mean? Every week, stu- dents at residence are throwing out more than 1,630,728 square inches of garbage. In other terms, that’s approximately 943 cubic feet, or just over 26 cubic meters of garbage going to the landfill in single week. Prince George Sanitation used to donate recycle bins at the university but the stu- dents were said to be quite bad about con- taminating the recyclable items, and the city had to discontinue the recycling pro- gram due to irresponsible use. However, not all students at the univer- sity turn a blind eye to garbage. Adam Humphrey, a concerned student here at UNBC, is heading up the recycling pro- gram at the residence this year. On Saturday mornings you will find him and a small group of environmentally concerned students collecting recyclable items door to door in one building per week and in the mailroom of each build- ing every week. This service takes about 2-3 hours depending upon how many people volun- teer that week and how much recycling there is. Items that'can be recycled through the recycling program are: tetra packs, plastic and glass bottles and jars, newspapers, magazines, scrap paper, batteries, cell phones, tin cans, aluminum cans, and plastic milk jugs, and there are exhaustive lists around campus if this list is unclear. Every week this program makes some money, which is being put aside to- buy a recycling bin for students. Humphrey is also connected to the Prince George Public Interest Research Group (PGPIRG), which is involved in many garbage-reducing initiatives around the school, such as the composting pro- gram, a Styrofoam eradication program, and a scrap paper project. The composting program is perfect for reducing household waste that is not suit- able for recycling, such as coffee grounds and most food waste, and is available to people in residence and in the school. Buckets for the program are available to be bought from PGPIRG for 50 cents each. According to Humphrey and many oth- ers, the best way to decrease waste is to do things like decrease your reliance on pack- aged foods, to think about your needs ver- sus your wants while you are shopping, being aware of the things that you eat, _ buying locally / regionally / provincially or nationally and by realizing that there is a point where convenience reaches absurdi- ty. Thinking about what you use and how you buy it is the best way to decrease waste - you decrease waste by not buying. it in the first place. In the broader picture, residents of the Prince George are given more opportunity and leeway to waste and not to recycle. Prince George allows a maximum of four containers to be collected per week. Compared to other middle sized cities, such as Grande Prairie Alberta, Prince George allows one more bag of garbage per week, and cities like Kelowna, only permit two bags of garbage per week, per household. To compensate, cities such as Kelowna offer curbside recycling which 92.5% of residents take advantage of. In 2003, 9000 tones of recycling were collected per month, from a city with bare- ly more than 20,000 more residents than our own. In Prince George there is no similar pro- gram, despite the fact that curbside recy- cling programs have been proven to reduce waste by 50% in other Canadian cities. Instead, Prince George has a number of facilities for dropping off recyclable goods, but most are seriously underused, saving only 14589 tones per year in 2000. Humphrey makes a good point when he says that the best way to help is to lower your consumption and not to rely on recycling. According to Humphrey, recycling is just a reactionary thing that we would not need to focus on so much if everyone would “curb their consump- tion.” Until these things are learned, how- ever, it is fortunate that there are programs like the residence recycling program, and people like Humphrey to do the dirty work of reducing waste. It is possible to reduce waste markedly in residence and in the school by support- ing this initiative and others. If you are interested in helping out-with this project or others you can contact the group at unbc_recycling@hotmail.com.